Home >> Resources >> Community Policing Topics: Alternatives to Incarceration

Lawmakers, law enforcement and community activists agree that effective public safety strategies must include a variety of responses to crime and criminal behavior. Mass incarceration and a focus exclusively on arresting and jailing offenders has not provided sustainable solutions.

The community policing philosophy requires that police use holistic and proactive approaches to improving the health and safety of our communities, and for this reason the COPS Office offers the field support on critical alternatives to incarceration: successful reentry and the use of treatment courts. Community policing officers play a very important role in building trust with returning citizens, and in supporting efforts to reduce recidivism rates, while treatment courts (veterans, drug and mental illness) can address the underlying root causes of some criminal behavior.

Monitoring Offenders on Conditional Release
Provides police officials with an overview of community supervision, discussing the characteristics of offenders, the varieties of monitoring strategies, and the identification of best practices in probation/parole-police partnerships